This invention relates to an electronic device for identifying intervals or chords in a particular key for a fretted stringed instrument. More particularly, the invention relates to an electronic device which will indicate the finger positions on the strings of a fretted, stringed instrument represented by a particular series of musical intervals or a particular chord in a particular key. The device will further permit easy transposition or identification of such musical intervals or chords from one key to another.
This invention is related, although by no means identical, to the keyboard display device described and illustrated in my U.S. Pat. No. 4,048,634, issued Sept. 13, 1977.
It is understood, from musical theory, that in a given key of the chromatic musical series, each note has a "value" or "musical interval". For example, in the key of C, the note E has value or musical interval which is a "major third", while the note G is a "fifth" and the note B is a "major seventh". The note D sharp appearing in the octave above that of the root position of C, in the key of C, is an "augmented ninth", and so forth. For a guitar or other fretted, stringed instruments, the playing of a particular chord is accomplished by pressing and securing individual strings of the instrument at various, predetermined fret positions so that when all or a group of the strings of the instrument are struck simultaneously or in sequence, that chord or the notes of that chord are sounded. As will be understood by anyone who has studied guitar or other fretted instruments, the spread of the fingers of the player in depressing the strings to play a chord is usually no more than four frets. As well, by moving the finger positions for a particular chord up or down one or more frets while maintaining the same relative finger positions across the strings of the instrument, equivalent chords, but in a different key, are sounded when the strings are played. Thus, for example, in a guitar, the C major chord is sounded when the first, second and sixth strings are depressed in the eighth fret, the third string is depressed in the ninth fret and the fourth and fifth strings are depressed in the tenth fret. In actually depressing the strings as indicated to enable the playing of such a chord on a guitar, the index finger of the playing hand would lie across all of the strings on the eighth fret, this being called the "bar position" or these strings being "barred" on the eighth fret. The second finger would then press the third string on the ninth fret and the remaining fourth and fifth fingers would depress the fourth and fifth strings respectively at the tenth fret. Having located one fingering position for the C major chord, at the eighth fret, by moving the fingering "up" one fret so that the index finger bars the six strings at the seventh fret, a B major chord may be played. By moving the fingering up yet another position, a B flat major chord or an A sharp major chord is played, and so on.
It is significant, when understanding the theory behind chording on a guitar or other fretted stringed instrument, and as well in understanding the theory behind the present invention, to realize that each string is tuned for a particular "note" and that by depressing the strings of the instrument at various positions, various alternative notes are then played on that string. These notes have particular values or musical intervals depending on the key which is intended to be played. For example, returning to our example of the C major chord as played on a six stringed guitar, a guitar which is tuned as follows:
first string--E PA1 second string--B PA1 third string--G PA1 fourth string--D PA1 fifth string--A PA1 sixth string--E,
this chord requires, if the bar position is on the eighth fret, pressing the third string on the ninth fret, fourth and fifth strings, on the tenth fret with the rest of the strings barred on the eighth fret. The first string, when depressed on the eighth fret, results in a note eight semitones higher, namely a C, this being a root position of the C major chord. The second or B string when depressed on the eighth fret, produces a G note which is a fifth position in the key of C; the third string, being depressed on the ninth fret for the C major chord, gives an E note (i.e. nine semi-tones higher than G), this being a third in the key of C. The fourth or D string, depressed on the tenth fret, results in a C or root position note; the A string depressed in the tenth position results in a G or fifth; the last or E string, depressed in the eighth position, results in a C note, again being the root position of the C major chord. It will be seen that only the root, third and fifth "intervals" are thus played on the guitar, these being, as we would expect, proper musical intervals to be played for a major chord in that particular key. By moving this same fingerng up or down the frets of the instrument, the root, third and fifth positions are still maintained, albeit for a different key depending upon the fret positions of this fingering. In a similar manner, any of the other chords for the key of C may be worked out, for example using the eighth fret as the bar position. For instance the C major seventh chord having the same fingering as the C major chord, with the exception that the fourth string is depressed on the ninth fret instead of the tenth fret (this results in a note of a seventh interval, instead of a note of the root position for this key, being played). Thus the C major seventh chord has notes representing root, third, fifth and seventh positions being played. The fingering of C suspended fourth, C ninth, C minor, C minor seventh, C minor eleventh, C minor thirteenth, and any other words chords which a musician might wish to play in the key of C can be similarly studied and learned for example using the eighth fret as the bar position, the fingering and musical intervals of the particular notes of the strings played, being derivable in a similar manner to that described above. Equivalent chords for any other key, such as F, with appropriate fingering positions and the equivalent musical intervals of the respective notes played by the strings having that fingering, may be derived either by using equivalent relative fingering positions from another key such as C and moving the fingering up or down an appropriate number of frets. Alternatively, different relative fingering for a particular bar position, to give the F chords for that particular position, may be worked out, as illustrated above for the key of C.
Chording in a particular key, accomplished by depressing the strings on the particular frets to give notes having appropriate musicial interval values for that key, is an essential element in the playing, teaching or studying of music on such a fretted, stringed instrument.
Heretofore, aids for the teaching or study of music for stringed, fretted instruments has been mainly restricted to charts in books, such charts setting out illustrations of the strings and frets of that particular instrument, together with some indication of the fret positions for each of the strings to be played to achieve a particular chord in a given key. A single, written diagram for a single chord in a particular key is shown in such charts.
There has been little or nothing in the way of mechanical or visual keyboard teaching devices for guitars, in the nature of the mechanical or chart devices as described for keyboard instruments in Canadian Pat. No. 910,991 of A. J. Weis, issued June 8, 1965 or Gaillard, Canadian Pat. No. 773,425, issued Dec. 12, 1967, or Smoyer, et. al., Canadian Pat. No. 831,713, issued Jan. 13, 1970. This latter patent describes and illustrated a visual keyboard teaching device providing a visual indication, directly on a keyboard instrument, of the companion manual and clavial keys to be associated to a sound chord triad, with the accompanying bass note. My previously indicated U.S. Pat. No. 4,048,634, issued Sept. 13, 1977 describes a small lightweight electronic instrument which indicates the note of a keyboard instrument represented by any musical interval in any key so that a musician can, using the device, produce a visual indication of the location of notes or chords of that keyboard instrument on the display area of the device.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a small lightweight electronic device, to be used in the study or teaching of music for fretted, stringed instruments, which will identify the finger positions required to achieve a particular chord in a particular key. It is a further object of the present invention to provide such a device which will enable easy transposition of and location of string and fret finger positions of corresponding chords in different keys.